5 Most Interesting Things We Learned From Tesla's Recen…

Tesla on Wednesday released its fourth quarter earnings results, and Chairman and CEO Elon Musk said that the highly anticipated $35,000 Model 3 and solar roofs will launch in the second half of 2017.

At the end of last year, the company had delivered 76,230 cars to customers, lower than its goal of 80,000 to 90,000. Musk anticipates that 47,000 to 50,000 Model S and Model X vehicles combined will be delivered to customers combined during the first half of the year. “We are on track to generate $500M in cash (including growth of non-recourse project financing) by 2019,” he wrote.

Here are other interesting things we learned from the earnings results:

1. Leadership changeThe company announced that Tesla CFO Jason Wheeler will be leaving the company in April and will be replaced by his predecessor, Deepak Ahuja, who took on the job in 2008 and left in 2015.

Wheeler said of his departure in a statement from the company: “After spending the last 15 years helping to make information accessible to everyone and to advance sustainable energy, I’m looking forward to continuing to champion these causes and others from a public policy perspective.”

2. Inclusive packagesOn an earnings phone call, Jeff Evanson, the company’s VP of investor relations, said that Tesla has begun offering customers in Asia the option of buying a vehicle with the price of maintenance and insurance included, with plans to provide that choice in other markets.

3. DIY repairsIn his letter to shareholders, Musk wrote that the company had plans to grow its service that lets drivers make repairs at their workplace or home as “80 percent of our repairs are so minor that they can be done remotely.”

4. More GigafactoriesThe company will also be working towards building three more battery factories. “Installation of Model 3 manufacturing equipment is underway in Fremont and at Gigafactory 1, where in January, we began production of battery cells for energy storage products, which have the same form-factor as the cells that will be used in Model 3,” Musk wrote. “Later this year, we expect to finalize locations for Gigafactories 3, 4 and possibly 5 (Gigafactory 2 is the Tesla solar plant in New York).”

5. Labor issuesAfter allegations of mandatory overtime and long hours, Musk said that he did not believe that Tesla factory workers at the Fremont, Calif., plant would unionize and that he was planning to publish his findings about working conditions soon. One stat he reported was that the injury rate in Tesla’s factories was less than half of the car industry average.